What Do Management Consultants Actually Do?

So you’ve just learned about the existence of companies like McKinsey & Company, Boston Consulting Group, Bain & Company, and a few others. They all have jobs for management consultants, but you have no idea what that actually means. Well, if you wanted to learn a little more about management consultants and management consulting, this article is for you.

Management consultant is actually a very loosely used job title. Everyone who advises anyone on anything these days calls themselves a management consultant, but in this article I’ll be focusing on a specific type of management consultant – ones that work for large organizations and advises executives of other large organizations.

What Do Consultants Do?

The short answer is it depends, but essentially management consultants do everything. Management consultants are hired to solve problems for organizations. These problems could range from needing some expertise in a software system to figuring out what direction to take a company in the next five years.

Above all else, the most important thing consultants do is they provide advice and solutions for companies that they otherwise would not have been able to obtain themselves.

What is a Typical Day Like for a Management Consultant?

Just like what consultants do, a typical day is just as varied. For many consultants, they generally travel to their clients from Monday to Thursday and return home on Friday to work from the local office. They attend meetings, conduct research, create Power-Point presentations, and deliver solutions. After the project is over, management consultants usually jump into a different project at a different company facing a different problem that needs a solution.

What are the Requirements to Become a Management Consultant?

Generally speaking, management consultants are very well educated. They have at the minimum bachelor degrees and often go on to pursue advanced degrees to further their skillets. They also undergo a lot of industry certification training as well as internal company training as they are expected to be the experts in whatever field they’re consulting in.

There’s no specific background for a management consultant. Many management consultants come from a business background as business advice is always valuable to companies however, management consulting firms have expert consultants in every field you could possibly imagine.